Syncrude upgrader facilities on the Athabasca river near Fort McMurray Alberta

Dec 18 2018 – Collection of articles and reports – Kevin Yaworski

It not the investment AB asked for in oil carrying rail cars or actions towards more pipeline capacity. They have tried to soften the blowback from opponents by saying some of the funds being invested in green growth and training.

The big questions mainstream media are not asking are why did the industry and governments not diversify and save some of the Billions of dollars in revenue during boom years to carry them through the rough periods? Canada must now play catchup to other countries that have invested heavily in alternative and more sustainable energy sources and exports.

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Subsidies for the oil and gas industry in Canada have been about $1-3 Billion per year as per IISD, a non profit sustainable development organization with Canadian and international support. As per the IMF in a 2014 report it totalled at least $34 Billion per year in direct support to producers and uncollected tax on externalized costs.

Little to none of the revenues from boom years has been invested in national wealth or rainy day funds.

To make matters worse Canada and its Provinces have not enforced much of the required cleanup from this industry. They have allowed the industry to self regulate including acquisitions that led to bankruptcies and now taxpayers on the hook for Billions of dollars of outstanding environmental cleanup.

They have also racked up net debt totalling over $1 Trillion dollars which is rising along with enormous interest payments.

Unlike Norway which has invested much of its oil and gas revenues since 1990 into a national wealth fund that is worth over $1 Trillion US and equates to $195,000 per Norwegian Citizen.

In 2014 the International Monetary Fund estimates that energy subsidies in Canada top an incredible$34billion each year in direct support to producers and uncollected tax on externalized costs.

These figures are found in the appendix of a major report released last year from the IMF estimating global energy subsidies at almost$2trillion. The report estimated that eliminating the subsidies would reduce global carbon emissions by 13 per cent.

Global investors issued a stark warning to politicians at COP24, the 2018 United Nations climate summit in Poland. Companies with a combined investment portfolio of $32 trillion demanded that countries scale up efforts to phase out fossil fuels as soon as possible. In addition to energy, forests are another crisis point in the battle to contain carbon dioxide emissions.

Yet much less is known about investment flows to companies operating in, for example, the Amazon rainforest.